When attempting to determine an exact construction date for a home, we often turn to maps to aid in this effort. This is, of course, as a form of visual/graphic evidence in conjunction with other documentary evidence, such as deeds, mortgages, etc. Not to be overlooked, however, are historical aerial photographs. In the same way that maps from various years can help to narrow down a range of possible construction dates or to observe development of a neighborhood over time, aerial photographs can provide a literal and visual representation. The key, as with maps, is knowing where to look and how to interpret the images found. While the ideal scenario would be to find at least one dated image prior to the house's construction and be able to compare it to one or several images post-construction, this would not be possible if the house you are researching is older than about 1920. Still, it is likely that aerial photographs exist for your home dating back several decades and thus still extremely interesting and useful to examine for your research.
A circa 1928 aerial photograph of my neighborhood, located via PhilaGeoHistory. My house is highlighted with the purple arrow, about 5 years after its construction.
A Brief History of Aerial Photography
Aerial photography has been linked to the documentation of our built environment ever since its invention in the mid-19th century. According to the Professional Aerial Photographers Association, early aerial images were taken over Paris and Boston by pioineers in hot-air balloons in the 1850's and 60's. Over the next fifty years, photographers continued aerial experiments, strapping cameras to rockets, kites, and even pigeons. By World War I, photos were being taken from another recent invention, airplanes, and were regularly used to document battle maps during the War. Due to further technological innovation, largely by Sherman Fairchild both during and after WWI, aerial photography became adopted and popular for wide government, civilian, and commercial use starting in the 1920's. Nowadays, satellites capture the bulk of aerial imagery, but the moments in times past which we wish to view here would have been taken from airplanes.
Sources for Aerial Photographs
Places to inquire about aerial photographs throughout the past 90 or so years include libraries and historical societies, which can possibly point you to more specific repositories or quasi-governmental agencies or planning authorities. The latter may have commissioned aerial photography in your area for regional planning purposes at several points in time.
Many of these may ultimately be available to access online. Try a Google search for "historical aerial photographs (your state/city)" and you might run across a government agency or library with a stash of old aerials. Locally (to me), the PhilaGeoHistory website run by the Philadelphia Athenaeum includes a section of aerial photographs not just the City of Philadelphia but for the metropolitan area at large. The United States Geological Survey (USGS) has a plethora of satellite and aerial imagery available, including an entire section of "Historical Photographs" from 1937 to the present. A link leads to the USGS Earth Explorer image search where you can search by address, then select different checkboxes under "Data Sets" to see if you can find any of those images for your area. Basic resolution images are free to download, whereas high-resolution images are available for a fee.
A number of commercial websites are available as well. Google Earth is likely the most well-known, has some historical imagery (in Google Earth 5 and later), and also has a neat "slider" feature which allows you to slide back and forth between images from different years. Most of the images in Google Earth appear to be fairly recent (1990 or later).
Screenshot of Google Earth historical imagery. The "slider" is shown at the upper left. The earliest available image for my neighborhood on Google Earth was from 1992 (and the roof of my house is washed out in the low-resolution image, rendering it difficult to see. Image quality varies from year-to-year.
The homepage of Historic Aerials displays a map of the United States covered in two shades of green-- the dark green areas have "historic" images available, whereas the remainder only have aerial photos from 1990 or later. Although the website considers anything before 1990 "historic", I've found that many of the shaded areas have available images back to the 1920's and 1930's, with several years in between available. It is quite easy to navigate from year to year at a specific location. The only difficulty is the large watermark which can make it difficult to view detail and only goes away if you purchase the image.
Screenshot at the homepage of Historic Aerials. Although images are generally available throughout the United States, the areas marked in the darker green are more likely to have earlier and older images available.
Screenshot on the image viewer at Historic Aerials. For my neighborhood, images are available to view for 13 different years, spanning from 1948 to 2013.
Vintage Aerial is a very unique website, focusing on rural areas and small townships, and their collection of images are oblique views (rather than a straight-down bird's eye view), which is a neat perspective. One can select any county in the U.S. and the results will tell you if their archive includes images from that county, as well as from which years. It appears that manually browsing images by film roll is the only way to view them at this time, but it is relatively simple to pick a film roll and scroll through the images in the roll. As for finding the right roll, many archive years are accompanied by a "flight map" of the county which includes a guide (which appears to be hand-marked by the original photographer), marking the coverage areas of each film roll. Locate the area on the map you are seeking and hopefully a flight path is marked with a film roll number. Navigate back to the list of film rolls from that year and choose the correct film roll to scroll through the images.
1964 Flight map from Vintage Aerials website in Montgomery County, PA. This map marks each film roll's coverage. The image below was found in Film Roll 88.
Although there do not appear to be any aerials from my particular neighborhood, I did find images from 1964 from the street where I grew up, but not my house's exact location. I was able to locate this image of a huge Victorian house I've always admired, about a mile from the house in which I grew up.
1964 image of a Victorian-era home, found in Film Roll 88 under Montgomery County at Vintage Aerial.
Finding Useful Information in Aerial Images
As you gather images from various years, you will find a wide range of image clarity-- even an image from as recent as the 1990's may not be as clear as an image from 1930. Within the last decade or so, however, satellite imagery has become extremely clear. The most helpful aid which a series of aerial photos could provide would be to help pinpoint the year of construction of a house. If you happen to find an image from 1948 and a house does not exist in it, but it does appear in a 1950 image, then you know that the house was constructed sometime from 1948-1950. This image below is a comparison between a circa 1928 image and a circa 1930 image. Houses which appear on the later image, but not on the earlier image we know were recently constructed as of the date of the second image.
The houses marked by the arrow in the 1930 image were recently completed as of that date, since they did not exist at all in 1928.
As mentioned previously, since aerial photography did not become common until the 1920's, if the house you are researching is older than that, then you will not be able to find images for this purpose, but viewing and examining what you can find will still be useful and interesting.
You may recall from mypreviousposts that I believe the construction date of my house to be between May 1922 and November 1923 based on numerous types of documentation and analysis. The earliest aerial photograph I was able to locate for my neighborhood was an image labeled circa 1928 (found via PhilaGeoHistory, as part of the collection of the Free Library of Philadelphia). There are no images from prior to my house's construction, but it is still neat to see photographic evidence of the house's existence this early, only a few years after its construction.
Portion of an image, located via PhilaGeoHistory. My house highlighted with purple arrow.
Although the resolution of the image is not extremely clear, you can see the house as one of the few existing on this portion of Central Avenue, something that further confirms evidence found in early atlas maps. The lightly-colored area is actually my entire current property, with the actual house only distinguished by a shadow line at the back of the house. The reason why the whole lot is lighter than other undeveloped lots may be that grass and other growth may have been cleared off of the property and had not yet re-grown, or had regrown in a distinctly visual way.
What you also notice here is the loose outline of a tree line running from northwest to southeast just along my property line, continuing on along multiple properties. This tree line then turns northeast a few blocks away, on either side. To see the reason, see this clip from a 1916 atlas map.
Portion of a 1916 atlas map, via Franklin Maps. My house's location highlighted in purple.
We can also zoom out on the c. 1928 aerial image.
Portion of a c. 1928 aerial image, located via PhilaGeoHistory. To the right, the Spear tract is highlighted with a purple boundary. To the left, we see how a tree line defined much of this boundary.
Although the map is oriented to align with the property, this 1916 map is the latest which depicts the land tract previously owned by Emma Spear. In 1919, she sold this land to Philadelphia jeweler Reginald Ferguson, who subdivided the land into individual home lots. The tree lines in the c. 1928 aerial image correspond to the border of Spear's former land. In the aerial image, we see that this land has only sparsely been developed in the preceding 7 or 8 years, although most of the streets have been laid out (although nearly certainly unpaved) to align with other existing roadways. The 1928 photograph also shows us the already-established residential development to the southwest (labeled "North Glenside" to the left in the 1916 map).
Jumping ahead in time to 1959, some of this tree line remains, and you can see that the neighborhood of Ardsley has now been largely filled with single-family homes throughout. Suburbia has taken hold.
Aerial image of the Ardsley neighborhood, 1959. Located via PhilaGeoHistory.
Zooming in on my house now.
Most of my neighbors' houses have now been built prior to this 1959 image, including the long row of stone-fronted Cape houses running to the southwest. The exception is the ranch house on the north side which was built in the 1970's. You can see the empty lot adjacent to my house which at the time of this image was owned by the owners of my house, the Cantlins. This image was also captured at least a decade after the Cantlins expanded the size of this house-- the purple arrow points to the rear addition constructed in the 1940's.
Have Fun!
These types of images should not be overlooked as part of the historical analysis of your house's history. They are an extremely fascinating way to gain photographic and visual evidence of the evolution of both your house and its context within the greater neighborhood. See if you can locate multiple aerial images over time for your home, and have fun taking a peek at these literal snapshots in time!
Slowly, over the last month, the grouted joints between the ceramic tiles in our main bathroom have begun to crack. This has occurred to a minor degree ever since we moved into the house nearly two years ago, but only recently began to become a real issue. The joint cracking was also more significant at the area right against the tub. I had already previously noticed that the perimeter of the ceramic tile floor (against the walls and against the tub) were hard grouted joints, rather than flexible sealant joints, leaving the flooring nowhere to expand and contract without cracking. I had been hoping that the problem was merely because of that sole issue.
Well, it wasn't. Finally, this week, two of the tiles against the tub came fully unbonded from the subfloor beneath. Once I was able to fully lift up these two tiles, the improper installation of this ceramic became evident:
Not good.
What you see here is old flooring, and at a small portion of this area you see wood subflooring, which is now wet on the top side (the underside has been and continues to appear sound from the basement). What you do NOT see is any type of backerboard or underlayment matting. In case you were wondering, that is NOT the way to install new ceramic tile over existing vinyl floor. Sigh. This relatively new ceramic tile is now useless-- it all needs to come out. I have already begun making calls to tile contractors to have them come out for estimates.
Well, Let's at Least Learn More History About This House
We might as well take a closer look then and understand the two layers of previous flooring I see here. I had to do this carefully, however. The reason that I'm not even considering replacing this tile myself, and providing another layer of concern, is that the dark-colored flooring you see has a very good chance of containing asbestos. Aside from removing the ceramic tiles for inspection, I have tried to not mess around with this and to keep it more or less as-is, due to the potential hazard.
First off, what do I know about the history of this bathroom? I know that this is the only bathroom of the two that is original to the 1920's house. The only other bathroom was converted from a kitchen in the 1960's. This original bathroom was part of the second living unit, used by family members of the Cantlins after the house was modified into a duplex. There used to be an exterior window at the tub area. After it was re-instated back to a single-family house by my house's previous owners after 2001, the window was infilled, the bathroom was remodelled, and a fiberglass shower surround was installed. The exact timeframe of the remodel is unknown. Judging by the floor tile installation, I'd guess that this was performed in preparation of placing the home on the market.
Anyway, the dark-colored tiles measure 9" x 9"-- a common dimension for vinyl-asbestos tiles produced prior to the 1970's. I'd guess that what I see here was originally installed in the 1950's or so, perhaps as the Cantlins began to convert the house to a duplex. It may even be older since there does not appear to be much of a pattern to it-- perhaps even the 1940's, when the Cantlins were building an addition onto the back of the house.
As for the lighter, beige-colored flooring, this appears to be from the 1970's or early 1980's. It has a decorative pattern and appears to have largely been removed with the exception of a few remnants at the tub.
Based on the small section and the partial fragments I am seeing, it could either have been a sheet or 12" x 12" tile. This could be more of a linoleum sheet product, but even in the 1970's-80's one cannot rule out vinyl-asbestos without having it lab-tested.
Next Steps
Asbestos-containing materials (ACM's) do not need to be a cause of panic by any means, if they are in good physical shape and are of the less friable varieties. In the case of vinyl-asbestos floor tiles, the percentage of asbestos in the tile's composition could be as little as below 5%. That said, these materials ABSOLUTELY must be treated with care, and consultation by professionals licensed to inspect for asbestos is always a good idea. In my case, you can see that at least one of the 9"x9" has broken once, meaning that at least a small, yet hopefully still safe, level of asbestos fibers may have been released.
My plan of attack is first to have a few professional TILE installers in to provide a consultation and recommendations. I want a company specializing in tile installation, not just a handyman that has the ability to throw down a few tiles. If the tile contractor I decide to hire is able to leave the old flooring in place to encapsulate it under a proper and professional installation, then all the better. If a proper substrate can not be provided over the old vinyl and it must come out, then I probably at least need to have the tiles tested and may need to have a licensed asbestos professional in sooner rather than later. Even if the tile setter is able to keep the old tile in place, at the very least I plan to have the air tested.
Even though this is an unwelcome monetary expense to deal with, it is always interesting to me to uncover old building materials. After all, I still consider these layers to be part of the history of the home.
Two weeks ago I was apprised of a newly available set of Homestead records by genealogy blogger Randy Seaver, in a post at his blog "Genea-Musings". These records are available at Ancestry and are images of original Homestead records for the states of Arizona, Indiana, Nebraska, Nevada, Ohio, and a portion of Iowa. While the aim of a site like Ancestry is to allow subscribers to search for documents related to their family history, many of the available records hold some applicability to house history research. Indeed, the relevance is clear in this case. If you live in a state where federal land was dispersed through this mechanism, then you just might find some neat information on your land's history.
Homestead Act of 1862
If you are unfamiliar with "homesteading" or the U.S. federal government's Homestead Act of 1862, it served an integral purpose in the settlement of the American West. According to the National Park Service, approximately 10% of the land area in the United States was settled and conveyed to private citizens under this legislation's purview. A much-simplified summary of how the process went is as follows (information via NPS):
An interested citizen (including women and former slaves) visited the nearest federal Land Office and applied for a specific parcel of land, usually paying $12 in fees and commissions.
The citizen spent the next five years improving the land parcel, by erecting a dwelling structure and farming the land.
After the 5-year period, he/she returned to the Land Office with another $6 fee, plus signatures from two other persons as an affidavit testifying to the land's improvements.
Final processing of paperwork resulted in a land patent being issued to the citizen, which he then would file at the local courthouse for recording.
Many of the dwellings built on homestead claim lands were of a more primitive and non-permanent nature; constructed of thatch, sod, branches, and other cheap and readily-available natural materials. According to this very detailed piece about homestead frontier homes, produced by PBS, claimants found little incentive to erecting permanent homes before the land was officially theirs, as many applicants were not successful in reaching that point. Further, simple shanties and shacks provided flexibility in that sometimes they could be relocated to other claim lands for which they applied. Once they received their land patent, they could then feel more comfortable to build, say, a log cabin. Even then, out in the tree-less plains, some were still further subjected to sod dwellings built into the landscape, until the advent of the railroads made frame-dwellings more of a possibility in these areas.
"I am looking rather seedy now while holding down my claim, and my victuals are not always served the best.
And the mice play shyly 'round me as I settle down to rest,
In my little old sod shanty in the West.
The hinges are of leather and the windows have no glass,
While the roof lets the howling blizzard in;
And I hear the hungry ki-yote as he slinks up in the grass,
'Round my little old sod shanty on my claim.
But I'm happy as a clam,
on the land of Uncle Sam,
in my little old sod shanty on my claim."
The Public Land Survey System
The above is all well and good for historical background information, but if you are reading this blog post then it isn't likely you are currently living in an old sod shanty. However, if you do live in AZ, IN, OH, NE, NV, or IA then perhaps your land, or some nearby, could be found in these records available online to give you some further information about what may have been on the land prior to currently existing development. Ancestry adds that "additional records will be added in future updates". While the easiest way to search these records would probably be with the name of a person who may have been a claimant, for house history research we may not always have that luxury-- we might only know the location. Alternatively, you can see if there are any Homestead records on file for the township where your land is located.
An aside is necessary, then, to introduce the Public Land Survey System. Whereas land in the original colonies of the eastern U.S. could be traced back to original land grants (such as those grants by William Penn in Pennsylvania), the federal government began acquiring additional territories, it established a rectilinear surveying system to subdivide land to the west of the colonies. Thus, land in 30 of the 50 states can currently be located via this rectilinear Public Land Survey System. This public domain land was divided into townships measuring 36 square miles each. Townships are then divided further into a 6x6 grid of sections measuring 1 square mile each. Sections can be divided further as necessary.
So let's say you live in one of these 30 states. Your land can be found in a section, within a township. A helpful online interactive map which can aid you in finding the specific township and section is provided by the Bureau of Land Management at http://www.geocommunicator.gov/blmMap/Map.jsp?MAP=OG. Just keep zooming into your specific area and the grid system will come into view, with accompanying labels. Let's take one of the included states in this records collection, Indiana. Some Google searching found this website dedicated to the history of land surveying in Elkhart County at the north end of the state. There, I was able to find an original plat map of the various 36-square-mile townships within the county, including Elkhart Township.
Cadastral Map for Elkhart Township, Indiana. Present-day Goshen, Indiana and surroundings. Subdivided into a grid of 36 1-sq-mile sections and even further into 144 quarter-sections. Notice "T 36 N R 6 E" written in the center: Township 36 North, Range 6 East. Courtesy of Elkhart County Surveyor's Office.
Interactive map by the Bureau of Land Management, zoomed into Elkhart County at Goshen, Indiana. The designation "36N 6E" is highlighted.
In the captions for both images above, notice that I've highlighted the legal description of the township location: Township 36 North, Range 6 East. What does that mean??
Well, each township is located within the country as it relates to a given base point. This map by the Bureau of Land Management shows the various base points throughout the country which are governed by the Public Land Survey System.
Map of Principal Meridians and Base Lines. Public Domain image, via U.S. Geological Survey.
The base points are established by north-south lines called meridians, as well as east-west lines called base lines. You can see a meridian line running north-south just west of the center line of the state of Indiana. A base line runs from west to east at the southern end of Indiana.
This map below, also from the Elkhart County Surveyor, illustrates townships as they are numbered in relation to these two reference lines. The "Township" geographical reference refers to a distance north or south of the base line-- "Township 36 North" is the line in the grid 36 townships north of the east-west base line near the south end of the state. The "Range" refers to a distance east or west of the meridian line-- "Range 6 East" is 6 townships east of that north-south meridian line. Elkhart Township "Township 36 North, Range 6 East" is highlighted in the state map.
Map of Indiana via Elkhart County Surveyor's Office. Meridian and Base Line highlighted by author. "Township 36 North, Range 6 East" highlighted in blue by author.
Experimenting with the Records on Ancestry
Now that we know how to locate a specific township and section using the Bureau of Land Management interactive map, we can then theoretically search for Homestead records pertaining to that specific township on Ancestry. Remember, only six states are currently available (AZ, IN, OH, NE, NV, part of IA). Frankly, I was a bit disappointed that the State of Indiana had by far the fewest number of records of the six states-- there were no search results in all of Elkhart County, let alone this particular township. There were only 29 results in total when searching the collection for homestead locations in the entire state of Indiana.
Screenshot of Indiana search results at Ancestry.com
Shucks, well okay. For the sake of illustration of what these records hold, let's work with one of the 29 available in Indiana. I chose the second result from the top, the record of Charles C. Bradley, with a final certificate date of May 9, 1903 (later found to actually be February 9 after looking at the record image). Clicking on the link to "View Record" takes us to a screen with a more detailed summary of this record and some of the basic facts:
Screenshot of record index summary for Charles C. Bradley in the U.S. Homesteads Records collection, at Ancestry.com
Those basic facts are that Charles C. Bradley was 57 years old in 1903 when he received his final papers. He was born in Indiana (circa 1846) and applied for his claim through the Brookville-Indianapolis land office. Also given is the location of the claim land using the Public Land Survey System-- Township 08 North, Range 02 East, Section 5. Let's locate this on the Indiana state map I showed earlier, as well as on the BLM interactive map:
Same state map as above. Township 8 North, Range 2 East is highlighted in blue.
BLM interactive map, east of Bloomington, Indiana. Township 8 North, Range 2 East is outlined in blue; Section 5 is highlighted.
From the BLM map, we are easily able to tell that this section of land is located near Bloomington, Indiana, to the east of Monroe Lake.
Now, to the record images available on Ancestry. Clicking on the record image on the summary page (or the word "View") will take you to the actual scanned images within Charles Bradley's claim file. There are over forty of them, so I won't describe or share them all here. To summarize, however, the files include: Mr. Bradley's original application; various receipts of fee payments; correspondence between the land office and the local newspaper near Bradley's claim regarding the public notice to be published about his claim; the affidavits of Bradley as well as two of his proof witnesses; and the final certificate from the land office. There is even additional correspondence addressed to Bradley stating that an affidavit is required from one of his witnesses to clarify that Washington Parks and George W. Parks are the same person.
Voucher from the Homestead file of Charles C. Bradley, documenting the Land Office's purchase of a newspaper notice advertising Bradley's intent to prove his claim. Accessed via Ancestry.
To speak to some of the more substantive content in these papers, we find that Charles Bradley applied for the homestead claim in December 1894. It encompassed a 40-acre portion, known as "Lot 9", of Section 5 (a 1-sq. mile section being 640 acres) According to his and his witnesses' testimony, he relocated to the claim land in October (or November) 1895 and lived there with his wife, two children, and one grandchild. Bradley erected a log house, a log stable, and a cistern with a total value of $100 (this land's first house!). [Aside: Charles Bradley, farmer, is listed in the 1900 census here in Washington Township, Brown County, Indiana along with his wife, Mary, and their 14-year-old grandson Bernice (maybe Bernie??) Hatchet; the two children mentioned in the homestead documents are not found in the household, but several other Bradleys are listed on the same census enumeration sheet; perhaps several family members settled here).
Charles Bradley's testimony given to prove his claim; The land and his improvements upon it are vaguely described; Accessed via Ancestry.
He subsequently farmed about 7 acres of his claim for five growing seasons. The land itself was described as partially timber (wooded) and partially as farming land. Charles Bradley himself described it as "hilly". Having never moved off of the land for any significant amount of time, Bradley appears to have met the requirements of the Homestead Act to receive patent to the land. In December 1902, he gave the land office notice of his intent to prove his claim before the clerk of the Circuit Court. In January 1903, he and his witnesses gave their testimonies. After the subsequent clarification of the name of one of his witnesses, he received a final certificate in February of that year.
Copy of the Final Certificate which Bradley received after his proof of claim was accepted by the land office in 1903; Accessed via Ancestry.
The legal description as described in these homestead documents for Charles Bradley's claim is "Lot 9, Section 5, Township 8 North, Range 2 East, 2nd Principal Meridian, Indiana". This description is much simplified as opposed to a detailed metes and bounds survey description, yet still very accurately gets one to the exact piece of land. For us, the only difficulty is that we do not have access to any plat map designating how to find the 40-acre "Lot 9"-- the 640-acre Section 5 is as precise as I can locate right here, right now. Using, again, the BLM interactive map, I've located Section 5 and then roughly outlined that same area on a Google Maps aerial image to get greater detail and a better overall sense of the terrain.
Section 5, Township 8 North, Range 2 East, 2nd Principal Merdian, between Belmont and Nashville, Indiana outlined on a Google Maps aerial image (subdivided further into sixteen 40-acre areas).
Indeed, much of this area does appear hilly and wooded even to this day. I always find it interesting how section and township boundaries remain evident even today, as seen at the clearly distinct farm lot outside the northwest boundary of the section. Perhaps one of the farmed areas along Route 46 was Bradley's Lot 9. We can't really know here, but it would likely be possible to find out with more research. We do, however, know that Bradley claimed 40 acres (1/16 of the 640-acre Section 5). I've divided Section 5 into 16 roughly equal areas, which could correlate to the way the section was subdivided. The unincorporated town of Belmont sits just to the west, from where all of Bradley's homestead witnesses hailed.
Conclusion
What I have just done here is essentially the reverse of what someone that currently lives on Lot 9 could have done. If one lives in this particular area, the Homestead records could have instead been searched directly for Township North 8, Range 2 East in Indiana to access these records relevant to their current land.
On Ancestry, searching the Homestead Records collection and restricting results to each of the six states individually, I found the following numbers of homestead records for each:
Arizona: 2,517
Indiana: 29
Iowa: 808
Ohio: 101
Nebraska: 77,257
Nevada: 579
This group of roughly 81,000 records (as of April 13, 2016) represents about 10% of over 800,000 records from the 30 homestead states. It appears that those folks in Nebraska have the highest likelihood of finding Homestead records at present, as this state was the first to have its records digitized, according to the National Park Service. It also appears that we can someday expect to have all 800,000+ records available online, at some point in the future, so keep checking back if you live in a homestead state.
If you do not have a paid Ancestry.com subscription, further information on requesting yet-to-be-digitized homestead records directly from the National Archives can be found here.
Hanging on the wall as we toured this house for the first time, in the front room, was this ink sketch of the house as it existed in 2001:
Honestly, this was one of the homey details we noticed as we walked through, placed there by the previous owners. There were a few more-- the enlarged ruler marking the growth of the sellers' children through the years; the old stone stove in the backyard with the heart-shaped rock on it. I certainly would not say that these little items "sold" the house for us-- we had already walked through the front door and realized that this was it, that we had experienced our "You'll know it when you see it" moment that comes for many in the home-buying process. These things certainly spoke to us, however. We replicated the growth chart idea by getting one ourselves after we moved in. Although I haven't done it yet, I plan on somehow finding a similar heart-shaped rock and presenting it to my wife and daughters at some point.
And finally, the sketch. After all the negotiation was completed, after the inspection was over but before closing day, we still remembered the sketch, and I wanted it. I assumed that the drawing, as was the house, was important to the sellers and didn't dare asking for the original sketch (although did hold out brief hope that they would kindly offer it up to stay with the house). Instead, I asked our realtor if he could pass along a request to allow us to make a copy of it. The sellers were kind enough to oblige and that's exactly what we did.
Although I've not had all that much communication with this former owner, I did ask him through email about the sketch, among other questions after I began hunting down the history of this house. His reply to the query was that the drawing was completed by an artist friend of theirs shortly after they purchased the house in 2001. It was a Christmas present to his wife for their first holiday in their new home. Sure enough, the drawing is signed by the artist and dated 12/4/01. For the life of me I've never been able to make out this artist's name-- George something. The last name starts with a "J" I believe, but the letters after that could be almost anything. I have not re-asked the previous owner as of yet.
Anyway, this is the house frozen in a moment in time 15 years ago. It is not very different today from the way it appeared then, although the untold story is that those owners painted it from white to the current olive green. They also put decorative vinyl shutters on the porch windows, the attic window, and the front-most window on that left side. You don't see those add-on shutters in the sketch of course. The front planting bed is much less crowded nowadays, with less bushes than are depicted here. The downspout on the left-front stone porch pier has been moved to the left side instead of being on the front face. I've wondered about the driveway at the left-side of the house in this image. Here, it looks like it extends nearly all the way to the backyard. Was it really like this? Today, most of this side-yard is grass and a picket fence aligns with the projecting bay window, terminating the current driveway.
Other than those frankly minor details, this is a spitting image of the house we know and love today. It also is pretty much the same as the public record image I found, dated to the 1990s. These two images show the house that Catherine Cantlin finally needed to move out of in 2001, after having lived there for the previous 70 years.
Have you ever had a painting or a sketch of your home completed? If not, consider doing so, both for yourself and for future owners. It's really a special detail that can remain with the home for a long, long time.
This week's Saturday Spotlight house is one with a storied past, a Folk Victorian in the Roxborough section of Philadelphia. It dates back to the latter half of the 19th century and was renovated and expanded in 1935-36 as a Colonial Revival.
Architectural styles can be tricky sometimes. They change over times, of course, and sometimes a homeowner will want to update or expand a home significantly, incorporating details and stylistic trends of the day. The physical evolution of a home may fool one into thinking that the currently presented architectural style was always so. Fortunately here, the current owner of this home has a few historical photos which their listing agent was kind enough to pass along.
Image of the rear of the house, prior to 1935 addition. Courtesy of homeowner.
The house as shown in this older photo is clearly a folk, vernacular form, presenting as a two-story I-house with a side gable on one side and rear and front-facing gables at the other end. Tales of this house have its origins as far back as the 1850's. The intricate turned porch posts and the brackets at the roof eaves, however, suggest a few decades later to me. While a Victorian-style porch was a very common addition to existing earlier Folk homes of this time period and could have come after the original construction, I'd still wager that this house was constructed closer to the 1870's due to the eave detail. The simple frieze trim over the windows also was more likely to have occurred a bit later than the 1850's. This historical photo gives us a fantastic demonstration of how shutters were actually functional back in the day. Second floor window shutters were louvered, allowing a breeze to enter on a warm day, while first floor shutters were often comprised of solid raised panels to increase privacy. This arrangement was thoughtfully extended and maintained in future additions.
The facade shown in the historic image above is the current rear of the house. Take a look at it compared to a present-day image of the rear facade (below) and notice the asymmetrical window pattern largely intact, albeit with a door replacing one of the first floor windows, another door added, and the cross gable removed as part of an extensive 1930's renovation. Today we see much more of a Revival style, with the original house down to side gables on both ends, now accompanied by lower-height additions continuing the side gable form. Dormers are added on both the front and back at roof level to continue the rhythm of the facade's fenestration pattern. The white German siding set off with dark-painted shutters gives the house a classic farmhouse look.
Current rear of the house. Image courtesy of The Sivel Group
Origins
The home currently sits on land at what is modern-day Andorra, in Upper Roxborough. However, this was not its original location; more on that in a moment. At the edge of northwestern Philadelphia, this area was largely undeveloped through most of the 19th century, with groupings of houses along Ridge Pike surrounded by larger ownership tracts. As of 1875, this immediate area was still referred to as “Manatawna”, a name which persists today in the form of Manatawna Ave. The exact land on which the house exists today is marked by the ownership of a Mr. Sebold in that same year. A structure is shown on the 1875 map further northeast of the home which is the subject of this piece, existing close to the corner of Spring Lane and Ridge Pike. According to the current owner, the original frame structure of our feature house may have been sitting further to the south along the banks of the Schuylkill River at this time, to be relocated to its present site later on.
Aerial image from 1930. The house, pre-addition on its new (and present) site, is marked with the red arrow to the west of Ridge Pike, the main north-south thoroughfare.
In the last decades of the 19th century, local railroad executive and philanthropist Henry Howard Houston began acquiring many of the large tracts of land in Upper Roxborough. Houston had already burgeoned the adjacent neighborhood of Chestnut Hill as an upper class haven, having amassed a wealth of land and establishing his own mansion residence there (Druim Moir). By the time of his death in 1895, Houston’s holdings in Roxborough had yet to be developed to a significant extent. That would change, however, with the efforts of his son Samuel Frederic Houston, who took over the Estate’s real estate holdings. The younger Houston set out to replicate the section as an elite residential area similar to Chestnut Hill, with grand ambition to construct a cross-country parkway from Chestnut Hill, with a large bridge over the Wissahickon Gorge and through Roxborough, connecting to the Main Line to the west. Those plans never materialized, nor did S.F. Houston’s hopes for a massive Cathedral in Andorra a few blocks away from our subject folk house.
Samuel F. Houston, circa 1900. Image courtesy of UPenn Archives
Instead, smaller-scaled plans did materialize in the core of the neighborhood. This occurred largely through Houston’s commissioning of professional architects, such as Robert Rodes McGoodwin, to design elegant residential houses, including what is now the Renfrew Center further down Spring Lane. This, too, is where the tale of the white folk house picks up. According to the owner, the original house was relocated from its location along the Schuylkill River to a new foundation on its present site on Spring Lane. The house, missing from a 1910 property atlas, may have been moved to this site shortly thereafter. It appears with its smaller, original footprint in a 1930 aerial photograph (seen above). A large-scale renovation and addition was then executed by R.R. McGoodwin, commissioned by Samuel F. Houston’s wife. The Houstons never lived at this home, but merely commissioned its expansion. Fortunately, building plans have survived for this work and are in the care of current ownership. The addition and alterations nearly doubled the footprint of the house, to its current 4,930 sf, and altered the exterior style to its present appearance.
Left: The title block portion of a drawing sheet for the addition of the house, courtesy of the owner. Right: Robert Rodes McGoodwin, architect of the modified end result. Image via UPenn Archives.
1950s to Present
This house continued its expanded existence into the next few decades and eventually came under the ownership of George S. Greene, a financial investment banker. Greene performed some alterations of his own, hiring contractor William Milton in 1959 to remove an existing porch (in the location of, and perhaps the same porch shown at the left side of the historical image) and to add a small one-story cinder block addition. This addition is manifested as the infilled-corner portion at the far right of the house when viewed from the street.
Building permit drawing for small addition, 1959.
Ownership changes continued through the latter half of the 20th century, with a Harry & Susan West selling the house to Frank & Elizabeth Blair in 1973. Mr. Blair was a medical physician. The Blairs owned the home until 1991, at which time they conveyed the property to Paul Tucker and Mary Rugala who held it for the next twenty years. The current owners have owned the home since 2011 and have performed a number of tasteful modern improvements, including upgrades to multiple bathrooms and a master bath. Yet, at the same time, the historic character of the house itself has been maintained, and it awaits a new owner to carry on the legacy.
